Microsoft OLAP Solutions

This is a guide to Microsoft's OLAP tool - which brings data mining to the masses. OLAP stands for "On-Line Analytical Processing" - a core technology behind most data mining tools. It allows users to create, change, and access information from "multidimensional" data warehouses almost instantaneously. The technique of viewing data in multiple dimensions helps users discover unexpected relationships - for example, that people who buy a particular brand of soap and tissue paper are more likely to buy a brand of cleanser. Recent events have seen OLAP explode, as Microsoft entered the market with a two-phase assault, introducing SQL Server 7 for data warehousing and the OLAP Server for data mining using SQL Server 7 and other popular databases. This is a guide to installing, using, and managing the new Microsoft OLAP server. After a quick overview of the core concepts of OLAP and the OLAP server, the author details the basics, including: how to install the server; how to use the server to access and update data; how to specify calculations; how to optimise and secure the server; and how to integrate the server with other Microsoft data warehouse tools.
The result is an in-depth guide to operating the server.